Dodgers place Tony Gonsolin on IL with elbow injury, activate Michael Kopech, Kirby Yates
The Los Angeles Dodgers are getting healthier. But even two steps forward comes with one step back on the injury front. On Saturday, the club activated relievers Michael Kopech and Kirby Yates off the injured list, but also made their 20th different IL placement of the season in putting Tony Gonsolin on the shelf with right elbow discomfort.
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Gonsolin has made seven starts this season in his return from Tommy John surgery, surrendering nine home runs and posting a 5.00 ERA in 36 innings. While the stuff has rebounded from his pre-surgery form (his average fastball velocity is up to 93.5 mph from 92.4 mph in 2023), his command has not, leading to issues with surrendering first-inning runs (seven in seven starts). Now, he'll land on the IL for the second time this season; he missed the start of the season after tweaking his back in the weight room during the final week of spring training.
Of the Dodgers' 20 IL placements this season, 17 have involved pitchers. While some of those placements have been due to preexisting issues the Dodgers had baked into their offseason aggression in acquiring arms, the number remains staggering. The Dodgers' current injured list runs 14 names long, including three of the team's big-name pitching acquisitions the last two winters in Blake Snell, Tyler Glasnow and Roki Sasaki.
Kopech has missed all of 2025 thus far due to a right shoulder impingement that cropped up this spring training. He'd already been delayed in the spring because of forearm-related discomfort that he pitched through in last year's postseason. Yates strained his hamstring last month, but had already taken on a heavy workload this season with 22 appearances in the team's first 46 games.
Now they'll reinforce a Dodgers bullpen that has thrown a league-high 272 innings this season and continued its shuffling of bodies by designating Chris Stratton for assignment for the second time in less than a month.
This wave of injuries comes in the wake of a similar spate a year ago, when the Dodgers entered the postseason with just three healthy starters. While the club still won the World Series, the club's brass called for an internal audit of some of their injury issues.
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'I've been around for, I hate to say it now, 23, 24 years,' Dodgers pitching coach Mark Prior said of the Dodgers' injury issues back in April. 'Unfortunately, injuries (are) still in the game at a prevalent (level), at a high level. I wish it wasn't, but it's an unfortunate side of the game.'
'I said this a lot, and I think anyone who doesn't say it is not being honest: There's a lot we don't know about injury stuff, and I think it's important not to pretend like we have all the answers,' Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman said last month. 'There's a lot to it that is really challenging, and we're hoping to continue to grow and learn from experiences and just try to make the smartest, best move we can, knowing we're going to make mistakes.'
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